Around 1,000 jobs are at risk at department store chain Beales, which says it could collapse into administration if it fails to find a last-minute buyer.
The Bournemouth-based retailer, which has 22 shops around the UK, is understood to be hopeful that a deal can be secured.
However, it could still be forced to enter insolvency.
The chain is the latest retailer to feel the pressure of soaring business rates and declining high street footfall, amid an increasingly brutal period for the sector.
Beales last month brought in advisers at KPMG to lead a strategic review, in order to find a profitable future for the business.
The company is currently in talks with landlords over rent reductions and it has been reported that the firm also spoken with two potential buyers, including a venture capital investor and a rival retail business.
Chief executive Tony Brown told a Bournemouth paper that the firm has struggled with difficult trading conditions.
He also criticised the "lunacy" of high business rates.
Mr Brown said: "We are confident that we have a solution for the business that will create a stronger if leaner Beales.
"We hope to have a stronger business at the end of the process. I can't predict which stores will stay and which stores won't because it all depends on landlords and local government.
"We're going through a process and we hope to be able to restructure the business for a profitable future."
The retailer was taken into private ownership by Mr Brown in 2018, 23 years after the company was floated on the London Stock Exchange.
The retailer's uncertain future comes as rival Debenhams pushes ahead with the closure of 19 stores this month.
Mothercare UK, meanwhile, closed all of its 79 remaining stores at the weekend after the firm's UK business went bust.
Beales stores are located in the following towns and cities:
- Beccles
- Bedford
- Bournemouth
- Chipping Norton
- Diss
- Fareham
- Hexham
- Keighley
- Kendal
- Lowestoft
- Mansfield
- Perth
- Peterborough
- Poole
- Skegness
- Southport
- Spalding
- St Neots
- Tonbridge
- Wisbech
- Worthing
- Yeovil
